| Status
of Preparations for War on Terrorism
Some
of the steps underway in the initial phase in the war on terrorism:
- US
aircraft landing at night in Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. An
unspecified amount of military hardware and personnel has
been positioned there, at former Soviet military bases.
- US
aircraft carriers Carl Vinson and Enterprise are in the area,
and aircraft carriers Theodore Roosevelt and the Kitty Hawk
are on their way to the area. A British aircraft carrier is
also on its way to the area. Total air power on the carriers
is over 500.
- 100
US aircraft have moved to forward bases in the area.
- An
as yet unrevealed number of troops are being placed in the
area, including 20,000 British troops in Oman.
- Per
Colin Powell, a persuasive case will be presented in the next
few days that Al Qaeda, the Afghanistan-based terrorist group
headed by bin Laden, was responsible for the attacks on 4
civilian aircraft, the World Trade Center, and the Pentagon.
Sources:
40
Years of Oil Left
For
the past 20 years, the world has been using much more oil than
it has been discovering. Oil production will likely peak in
about 10 years and then begin a steady decline.
Despite
the possibility of new discoveries, increased fuel efficiency,
or extraction of unconventional oil via difficult and costly
methods, the world's oil supply is likely to run out in about
40 years.
One
of the
switches will likely be to hydrogen gas produced by solar cells,
a resource now owned mostly by the oil companies. Once solar
production is ramped up, its cost will be cheaper than unconventional
oil.
Source:
- Sydney
Morning Herald [link inactive]
US
Unprepared for Biological Toxins
Most
of America is inadequately prepared for chemical or biological
attacks from terrorists. Production of vaccine for Smallpox,
a dangerous communicable threat, is years away. A vaccine program
for Anthrax is in disarray.
Smallpox,
eliminated from the world as a natural threat in 1980, can spread
like wildfire, kill 1 in 3 victims, and leave the rest blind
and disfigured.
Anthrax
spreads through spores, which if breathed in must be treated
within 24 hours with large does of conventional antibiotics.
If untreated, 8 of 10 anthrax victims die.
Source:
|
Terrorism
Causality
I
recognize the multiplicity of factors involved in terrorism.
Richard Dawkins and I are willing to lay much of the blame on
the doorstep of religious extremism. There is never a single
factor in any action, but make no mistake, religious extremism
resides at the core of ______ (most, almost all, all - pick
one) of the terrorism occurring in the present day.
The
following article steps aside from dwelling on religious extremism,
instead focusing on disenfranchisement, powerlessness, and a
host of other influences as being the explanations for the hate
we face.
Towards
the end of the article, the author recommends we raise the standard
of living for the world to eliminate terrorism.
While
I'm all for raising the standard of living for the world, the
higher the better, that is not an easily achievable goal and
certainly won't happen overnight, no matter how many folks wish
it were so. We can work towards that end, and should do so (something
I've been saying for quite some time), but I submit that terrorism
will not dissipate or disappear unless or until religious extremism
disappears.
Religious
extremism, while certainly helped by poverty and a lack of education,
is most fundamentally based on a suspension of disbelief which
resides at the core of all major faiths. That suspension of
disbelief is passed from generation to generation in the form
of religious brainwashing, and the only way to break that cycle
is a period of protection in which children are freed from single
mindset indoctrination into parental / societal faith.
In
any case, for the non-religious and some of the religious explanations
for environmental and psychological causes of terrorism, see
the following ...
Heart
of Darkness - Experts Explain Why Terrorists Hate So Much
Key
quotes from the article:
- "It
is hard to believe that the human mind could conceive and
commit such unspeakable acts. It becomes even harder when
[the terrorists] claim to act in the name of God and that
they are fighting a holy war."
- "The
hijackers are not psychotic people -- to call them that is
a disservice to the mentally ill."
- "You
don't necessarily need brains to be a terrorist, but you do
need singleness of purpose."
- "There
has to be sophistication and financial backing behind the
scenes, but the individual terrorists are more like criminals,
like pickpockets looking for a victim, for the right opportunity
to strike."
- "To
kill other people, terrorists coldly planned their own death.
Killing oneself goes against survival instinct. When suicide
attackers are celebrated as heroes not only by their political
group but even by their own mothers, what message is given?"
- "Working
down from bin Laden to his ideological clones, we reach the
roots of the evil. Surprisingly, they are misguided adolescents,
who are all too ready to strap themselves to explosives for
the promise of eternal pleasure from 30 virgin brides, not
to mention a place in the history books. That's a pretty heady
mix. It's not hard to make a terrorist, given the right set
of cultural circumstances."
- "Once
the cult leader has persuaded the individual to become a follower
of his ideology, all else becomes irrelevant, including other
people's lives."
- "Extreme
hostility may be at play in anarchists who believe that the
world is evil and thus has to be destroyed."
- "Terrorists
get a sexual thrill from destruction and they harbor revenge
fantasies stemming from their feelings of helplessness, social
disconnectedness, and rage. They're predatory like an animal
stalking its food -- killing without thinking about the consequences
to its prey. Yet the hijackers told passengers to phone home
to tell their loved ones they were about to die. That's sadistic
stuff that criminals do, thoroughly enjoying seeing their
victims squirm."
- "They
are accomplished liars, [living in] a false world, which they
have constructed out of their hateful thoughts and revengeful
motives. They do not consider their destruction as the demise
of our world, rather it is a selfish and irrational attempt
to stop us from causing the demise of theirs."
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